Fernando Bryce (Lima, Peru, 1965) is one of the most renowned Peruvian artists on the international art scene. His extensive body of work is a focused reinterpretation of pertinent, historical, socio-political events and personalities of the 20th century. Bryce dives into an exhaustive investigation of bibliographical and documental archives in search of texts, images, magazines, political pamphlets, posters, advertisements and archival newspapers, in order to bring printed documents to the surface that have been deter mined historical and in which significant events of recent history are materialized. Departing from this graphic material the artist realizes drawing series in ink on paper, in which he meticulously reproduces the images and texts caught his attention, with the objective to gain perspective on how what is determined history has been taken for granted and to offer the spectator an alternative point of view to the conventional narratives by decontextualizing past events and bringing them into the present.

Bryce’s work analyses the concept of memory from a critical perspective by appropriating iconography of once official documents he finds in archives and libraries all around the world. He intends to decipher the motives that at the time of publishing caused the materialization in print of some policies vs others, as well as the role they played within the power structures. Bryce’s work shows a deep interest in archives and their significance, the political finality of art throughout history and in the power relationships of the past century and their mediatisation. His discourse is rooted in the great political debates and ideologies of the 20th century, such as communism vs. capitalism, the wars (Cold War, Spanish Civil War, Second World War), conquests, revolutions and revolutionary movements (such as in Cuba) as well as certain personalities who played key roles in the unfolding of history. The critical gaze Bryce submits his representations to, based on prejudices and stereotypes some countries constructed about their opponents, evolves into a drawing exercise in which historic memory is studied like a confluence of visual and editorial culture, archive and history.

Bryce uses irony to oppose the rigidity of the historic documents. He rescues and renews prints, engravings, posters and advertising materials and through what he named “mimetic analysis” -a method consistent of a manual copy of the mechanical document-turns the content of the archives into works of art. The ink drawings allow him to access the universe of writing without leaving the pictorial behind and like this transform the documental into something new, an image, always susceptible to questioning, especially when it is done in the present. In the time of mechanical reproduction his works the concept of the archive acquires all of its significance.